German athlete tests positive for doping at Sochi

Shane Mettlen

The Olympic cauldron is reflected in a logo on a window of the Iceberg Skating Palace during the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, Thursday, Feb. 20.

Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune/MCT

The 2014 Sochi Olympics continued late Thursday night with events carrying into Friday morning, while most in the U.S. were sleeping. Sochi is nine hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time.
Here’s what fans may have missed:

German athlete tests positive
Despite a long list of worries heading into the Sochi Games, the 2014 Winter Olympics have more or less gone off without much of a hitch, but a positive test brought a bit of negativity to the festivities early Friday morning. An unidentified German athlete failed a drug test the International Olympic Committee announced, marking the first doping case of the Sochi Olympics. The Germans reported a positive test in the A sample and the IOC is awaiting results of the athlete’s B sample. If it results in another positive, the IOC will bring official doping chargers.

Canada on top of women’s ski cross
Team Canada won gold and silver in women’s ski cross with Marrielle Thompson taking the gold and teammate Kelsie Serwa earning silver. Sweden’s Anna Holmlund added to her nation’s medal total, grabbing the bronze.

South Koreans support skater, not judges
Kim Yu-Na’s second silver medal of the past two Winter Olympics angered South Korean fans after the gold medal favorite finished just behind Russia’s Adelina Sotnikova, but their vitriol wasn’t directed at the popular figure skater. According to ESPN.com, Yu-Na’s performance has been repeated over and over again and dissected by Korean television stations who have determined it was a judging error that led to Yu-Na’s somewhat surprising second-place finish. Many Koreans said Sotniknova benefited from a home ice advantage of one kind or another. South Korea will host the next Winter Olympics in 2018 at Pyeongchang.

Americans continue to rack up medals
Team USA widened the medal count gap between it and the rest of the world slightly, pushing its total to 25, including eight gold. Host Russia has 23 total medals, including seven gold and the Netherland and Canada each have 22. The Canadians have eight gold after wins in women’s hockey and ski cross while the Dutch have six. Norway checked in with 21 total medals and the lead in gold, heading to the top of the podium 10 times so far.

Copyright 2014 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.